bug#80118: Don't just say "invalid date"
Paul Eggert <[email protected]> Fri, 2 Jan 2026 22:10:16 -0800
| Newsgroups | gmane.comp.gnu.core-utils.bugs |
|---|---|
| Organization | UCLA Computer Science Department |
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
On 2026-01-02 21:59, Dan Jacobson wrote: > also consider dealing with ET. Good luck with that. Is that eastern Australia time, eastern European time, eastern North America time, Ecuador/Egypt/Eritrea/Estonia/Eswatini/Ethiopia Time, East Timor, or something else? For what it's worth, POSIX does not allow "ET"; time zone abbreviations must be at least 3 characters. Also, real-world abbreviations are ambiguous, such as "IST" simultaneously standing for time in India, Ireland, and Israel. > $ date -d '01/30/2026 02:00 PM ET' > date: invalid date ‘01/30/2026 02:00 PM ET’ > > Don't just say "invalid date". Say "invalid date: weird time zone". Yes, it'd be nice if the date parser pointed out exactly what it didn't like.